Compliment, view, and walk.

1) M’s house at school wins the termly House Award, and part of the prize was a non-uniform day today.  She chose to wear her Big Sister Dress, and the White Sparkly Hug Me cardi I knitted her.  When she gets home, out of the blue, she told me that she’d received compliments on her outfit from three of her classmates 🙂 .

2) I happened to be upstairs in the kid’s school at lunchtime today and it so happened that lunchtime occured during a sunshine break between snowstorms…

I hadn’t quite realised how lovely the view from their classrooms is (across most of the Forth Valley, with the backdrop of the snow-capped Ochils), and how fortunate the kids are to be able to see it every day. I wonder if they realise?

3) An evening walk, just K and I.

Daffodils, friends, and outside.

1) K brought me some daffodils the other day, tightly folded into their buds. After a day or two in the warmth of the house, the buds are opening, and the beautiful golden heads are starting to emerge.

2) Friends came round in the evening, and we each made progress on our various crafts. It was good to spend kid-free time together, to work together, to share together, and to talk.

3) Sunshine, and snow. The hills surrounding us are beautiful, sprinkled in white, reflecting the sunshine. The day closed with a lovely sunset, and then the stars came out.

View, socks, and revelation.

1) The remnants of a beautiful sunrise and (almost) clear skies, ensured that the view from the school (which is up hill from where we live) across the snow-iced Ochils was truly stunning.

2) Two pairs of socks kept my feet almost warm on this crisp afternoon, as we walked along forest paths.

3) That mind-blowing moment when I suddenly realised just how my new scarf pattern was going to work. Then I understood just why everyone has been raving about the cleverness of the pattern.  I think I’m hooked already 🙂 .

No rain, beautiful view, and got it after all.

1) It didn’t rain today. At all. 🙂

2) The kids enthused about the view they saw from the school stairwell this afternoon… I’ve been up there before so I could imagine what it would be like – the school sits on a hill, with an incredible view across the valley. On a clear day like today, it would have been beautiful.  Most of the hills were autumn-brown, but the highest peak (Ben Cleuch) was snow-capped.

3) I returned an item I’d bought online to the shop, because it just didn’t fit nicely.  I had wanted to try a different size, but they were out of stock online. So I returned the item, and was about to leave the shop when I noticed a rack of them hanging up…  I tried one on, and it fit perfectly 🙂 .

Order from chaos, lovely view, and secret!

1) The path to finding M’s lost camera took me via the car and through several rooms in the house. As I worked my way through, I tidied and re-organised.  It wasn’t quite how I’d planned to spend the morning, but it was probably good in the overall scheme of things! And I found the camera in the end – in a bag, hung up behind the ironing board in the art cupboard.

2) We walked, the rain held off, we crunched through leaves, and the views were lovely.

3) I found some new winter pajamas for M today when I was out shopping. (She’s grown out of last year’s.) I haven’t given them to her yet, as I want to have them washed and ready-to-wear, but I know she’s going to love them when I do 🙂 .

Stopping, catching up, and out for a walk.

1) When you realise that all the things you thought you needed to do pale into insignificance, and all that matters at that moment is cuddling a precious bundle of tiny sleeping baby…

2) The joy of spending time with a friend I hadn’t seen in a while.

3) We head on out for a stroll in the evening sunshine. We went up to one of the local viewpoints, and enjoyed looking out across the river valley.  A and I both remembered this morning when the river was smothered by a sea of cloud, but the Ochils rose clear and high above it.

Visible, GBBO, and WIP Wednesday.

1) Today I could see across the valley all the way to the Ochils.  They’ve spent many of the last few days hidden in the clouds – it was good to see them again.

2) Dinner: sizzling venison grill steaks, in a delicious freshly baked baguette; accompanied by crisp, sweet, corn-on-the-cob with melted butter.  Eaten while watching last night’s Great British Bake Off…

3) In WIP Wednesday news, I’ve pretty much been working on the same two projects as last week – the Wendy Tank Top, and the Hitchhiker shawlette.  Unfortunately the camera and I didn’t manage to be located in the same place at the right time, so I don’t have any up-to-date photos.

However, if you’d like to see what they look like, then the Wendy Tank Top front (the back is complete and cast-off) looks a lot like this – perhaps a few cms longer.  And my Hitchhiker looks like a bigger version of this – with more than 37 teeth now complete.

For now, we have about 50 butterflies to stamp out of sugarpaste… did I mention that a certain Little Miss M has a birthday next week, and a party on Sunday??

For more of today’s wonderful Works-in-Progress, I recommend heading over to Tami’s Amis…  Happy Wednesday 🙂 .

Rainbow, dramatic, and sold.

1) A delicate rainbow traces its way across a dark expanse of cloud, illuminating and hopeful.

2) The scene before me is dramatic – towards Edinburgh it’s dark and moody and the Ochils have hidden themselves in the gloom. Moving westwards, the power station, with the Ochils behind, looms out of the mist. Further west again, and Dumyat is bathed in a pool of sunlight.

3) The girl in the shop couldn’t have been more friendly and helpful. “… and I’d tell you if it didn’t look good!”, she said. Trusting her judgement, I bought the item.

Climbing in the hills…

1) A glorious day spent climbing in the Ochils – we climbed Dumyat, a craggy 418m hill, situated at the western end of the Ochils, behind the Wallace Monument, Stirling.

 2) I started the day layered up against the predicted low temperatures. By the end I was down to two of my original six – the weather was just ideal :-).

3) We ended our hike with afternoon tea at the Coffee Bothy in Blairlogie, complete with delicious cakes. The whole day made pretty near perfect by the fact that we spent it with friends 🙂 .

Aidan, on the way up. 

Views across to the east, down the Forth Valley towards Edinburgh;

and to the north west, with the Highlands beckoning in the background. 
At the summit! 
Please click on any of the pics to see them in full size…

Straightforward, light, cherry blossom

1) The day which could have been a bit crazy, turned out to be quite straightforward as everything just fell into place.

2) Sunlight hitting the Ochils, just a few isolated patches of snow remaining on their summits.

3) K pruned a section of our cherry tree, now I have several branches in vases around the house. Their pretty white blossoms remind me that spring is here.